Joshua 5:4

4 This is the reason why Joshua circumcised them: ¹all the people who came out of Egypt who were males, all the men of war, died in the wilderness along the way after they came out of Egypt.

Joshua 5:4 Meaning and Commentary

Joshua 5:4

And this [is] the cause why Joshua did circumcise
Or the reason of the command given him to circumcise the children of Israel at this time, namely, what follows:

all the people that came out of Egypt [that were] males, [even] all
the men of war;
meaning such that were twenty years old, and upwards:

died in the wilderness, by the way, after they came out of Egypt;
not directly, but in a course of forty years, as they journeyed through the wilderness; this is to be understood with an exception of Joshua, Caleb, Eleazar but then there was a large number who were under twenty years of age, that came out of Egypt, and were now living.

Joshua 5:4 In-Context

2 At that time the LORD said to Joshua, "Make for yourself flint knives and circumcise again the sons of Israel the second time."

3 So Joshua made himself flint knives and circumcised the sons of Israel at Gibeath-haaraloth .

4 This is the reason why Joshua circumcised them: all the people who came out of Egypt who were males, all the men of war, died in the wilderness along the way after they came out of Egypt.

5 For all the people who came out were circumcised, but all the people who were born in the wilderness along the way as they came out of Egypt had not been circumcised.

6 For the sons of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, until all the nation, that is, the men of war who came out of Egypt, perished because they did not listen to the voice of the LORD , to whom the LORD had sworn that He would not let them see the land which the LORD had sworn to their fathers to give us, a land flowing with milk and honey.

Cross References

• 1. Deuteronomy 2:14